Secrets of the Mind 2: Ghost
by Kryptaria
Summary: In a world where almost a tenth of the population are born gifted, psychics and nulls live side-by-side, without fear or prejudice. Science has studied and categorized psychics by their gifts, developing the Darrow Scale by which the strength of those gifts are measured. But nature is balanced. When the Darrow Scale rating goes into the negative, the impossible walks: Ghost.
1. Chapter 1

It was like waking up with a giant cat, the sleep-heavy weight of limbs forming a warm cage around his body, hair tickling at his nose. Not that John minded having Sherlock wound around his body, face pressed to his chest. He never had nightmares, though Sherlock vehemently denied being a dreamwalker. More important, though, was that he had _Sherlock_ — beautiful, untouchable, aloof, cold-hearted Sherlock. And he was entirely, unbelievably in love with John.

"I want _more,_" Sherlock had insisted last night, already drifting to sleep without protest, even though he'd slept the night before and the night before that. He'd tucked his head into the hollow of John's shoulder and inhaled so deeply that John had felt the cool drift of air over his chest. "I want to breathe you instead of air. I want to _live _in you."

For all these past months, John had thought Sherlock a machine, a creature of pure logic and reason — some sort of anti-empath who had deleted emotions as unnecessary, and John couldn't have been more wrong. His arms went tight around Sherlock's shoulders as a shiver passed through him at the thought of how Sherlock must have suffered, hiding this.

"Not anymore," Sherlock said, the words slightly muffled by the sheets twisted around their bodies.

"Are you poking round my thoughts?" John asked, without any real heat. He'd never had any secrets from Sherlock before — not when the man could glance at him and read _everything_.

"You're broadcasting," Sherlock answered, shifting his body as if desperate for another inch of skin-to-skin contact. His feet flexed up, pressing against John's soles, and he flattened his hand against John's back as if he couldn't bear the thought of his curved fingers denying his palms that contact.

"It's because we're touching," John said, wondering just how far the skin-to-skin contact would go in breaking down the barriers between John's untrained, ungifted mind and Sherlock's.

Sherlock _purred_. It was the only way to describe the sound, and John found it absolutely adorable. John bit his lip to keep from laughing, but the purr turned into an indignant huff all the same. "John," Sherlock complained. "I am _not_ a cat."

"Yes. Yes, you are." John bent and pressed a kiss to Sherlock's disarrayed curls. "A great bloody cat who's suddenly discovered that us mere humans can be useful for petting," he accused fondly.

With another mock-grumble, Sherlock untwisted and prodded at John with his knee while tugging against his hip until he was on his back beneath John. "Obviously I'm not," he said smugly, wrapping his arms around John's body. "A cat would never tolerate this."

John lifted his head as far as the hand between his shoulderblades would permit. "Have you ever even _seen_ a cat, or have you deleted them all?" he teased. "The one I had growing up insisted on being underfoot and getting attention. Reminds me of this bloke I know —" He cut off with a grunted laugh as Sherlock finally managed to pull him back down.

Nuzzling into the crook of John's neck, Sherlock pointedly asked, "Are you getting rid of me for a cat, then?"

"I've put up with you for all these months, and I'm still here."

A shiver passed through Sherlock. His arms went tight around John as his breath caught. "You always will be," he said tightly. When John answered with a kiss, Sherlock insisted, "Say it, John."

It was heartbreaking to think Sherlock had never allowed this. If John hadn't looked up at just the right moment after they'd caught that murderer, if he hadn't put together a hundred minuscule hints, if he hadn't learned how to _observe,_ he might never have figured out Sherlock's secret. And they'd both still be alone.

"I swear it, love. I'll always be here, with you."

* * *

This one was different. Not the usual type who picked her up at all. Sharp suit in dark blue, neat tailored shirt, tie still knotted. No alcohol on his breath, no glazed eyes to betray the use of drugs. He was even polite, all, "Nice to meet you" and "If you wouldn't mind" and even "Thank you".

She didn't get a bad feeling from him. She didn't get a _good_ feeling from him, either, which was strange. She always knew which ones were safe and which ones were dangerous. In her early years, she'd ignore that danger-vibe for enough money, and she'd paid for it every time. So now, she listened to her instincts (because that's all it was — instinct, not empathy, not psy).

Funny. She'd never had one who didn't trigger an instinct one way or another. Not until this one.

No matter what, she'd remember him, she decided as she drifted off to sleep. She didn't normally do that, either, but this one wasn't going to toss the room for the stash of pound notes hidden in the wardrobe. He didn't need to — not with all those fancy cards in his wallet. He'd given her two hundred-pound notes and told her to keep the change, in fact. Too bad she didn't have a mobile, or she would've given him her number. Maybe he'd come back to her corner.

But he was nice and she was tired. Really tired. It was a blank, empty sort of tired, one that pulled her down as her energy seemed to just drain out of her body.

"Don't go to sleep."

Such a nice voice, he had, like listening to a song.

Then, he hit her. Nothing new, but not something _he'd_ done.

"I said, _don't sleep_."

Rousing was hard, like getting out of a warm bed on a freezing morning. She mumbled something, or thought she did, but her face was still stinging from the slap.

She should have been upset about that. She should have been angry. She wasn't one of _those_ girls. But instead, she just felt pain.

"You can't sleep yet," he said, and the hand that had slapped her now touched gently, stroking her hair away from her face. "Come on. Up."

He helped her out of bed. She was curiously detached from herself. It was like watching the first few minutes of a movie, when you didn't know the characters and didn't care about them. She got up and he pulled her dress down and she put on her shoes, and none of it really _mattered_.

"Why?" she asked. Or maybe she asked _where_ or _what_ — it was all the same to her. She couldn't really find it in her to care, but she thought she should say _something_.

"You're an empath," he whispered into her ear as he slipped an arm around her waist, supporting her. "Not enough to register, but enough to get _feelings_. That's how you know, isn't it? That's how you can tell which cars are safe and who's out for a quick fuck without paying."

She should have been worried. She _did_ get feelings, but she'd never thought anything of it. Lots of nulls got feelings — that's where superstition came from.

Oh, fuck. Was he from the police? Was he looking for unregistereds?

He hugged her close against his side, half-carrying her out of the room. "Shh. Don't worry. You don't have to be afraid anymore," he said soothingly.

She got her coordination back by the time they reached the narrow stairs, but he didn't let go of her. It took effort to rouse herself enough to ask, "Who?"

"The only person in the world who'll ever matter to you." He pressed a kiss to her temple, but it felt cold. Empty.

Together, they navigated the long line of steps and the dark hallway where the light was always out. They went out into the cold, damp night and she shivered, but only for a minute.

She was still cold, but she didn't seem to care.

"You still want to sleep, don't you?" he asked, leading her on the reverse of the path they'd taken earlier that night, heading toward the riverfront.

She nodded. She wasn't afraid, though she should have been, and she examined that lack of fear without any real curiosity.

"Then you should sleep," he told her. "I'll take you somewhere safe, and you can sleep. Would you like that?"

"Mmm-hmm."

Together, they walked towards the river.

* * *

John meant every word he said, although when 'here' changed from the cozy warmth of Sherlock's bed to the mucky edge of the Thames, he couldn't help but think that 'there' was definitely better than 'here'.

"Can't believe he won't do this professionally," Detective Inspector Dimmock said companionably as he walked to John's side. He offered a foam cup with steam coiling out the hole in the lid. A block away, the coffee shop was doing brisk business providing caffeinated warmth to the officers and forensics team.

"Thanks," John said gratefully, glancing at the detective only long enough to give him a smile. His eyes went right back to Sherlock, who was striding around like a force of nature, his mere presence driving everyone out of his path. His pale blue eyes were sharp and alive, sweeping the area, brow furrowed in concentration. His £600 shoes were covered in mud and river water had splattered all the way up to his knees.

John sipped at the cup and found it contained coffee, sweet and light. He normally didn't take sugar, but the wind was cruelly cold and the coffee was hot, so it was good enough. "Really, though, would you _want_ to work with him day-in, day-out?"

"You do."

John grinned. "Yeah, but as he once put it, I'm no saner than he is. I invaded Afghanistan," he said, breaking into laughter at the memory of how Sherlock had so calmly and logically pointed out that little fact of John's past.

Dimmock gave John a strange look, but that was nothing new. "Yeah, true. Puts the diviners in tears every time he finds something they miss. Wish I knew how he did it."

It wasn't the first time John had heard that statement, but now, it made his gut clench with apprehension. "The science of deduction," he answered as he always did, and hoped his voice was steady.

Sherlock had turned toward them, thank God, giving John the excuse to end the conversation. Dimmock stepped eagerly forward, asking, "Find anything?"

With a scathing glare, Sherlock snapped, "Of course I did, despite the mess your so-called diviners made of the scene. Next time, leash them so they don't contaminate the scene — or better yet —"

"Sherlock," John interrupted gently, as he always did right about at this point.

Sherlock's mouth snapped shut. His eyes flicked to John before he turned back to Dimmock. Somewhat more politely, Sherlock said, "At least your psychometrist got one right. It's a violent death, not a suicide."

"But..." Dimmock hesitated to state the obvious, though both he and John were thinking the same thing. "The victim's footprints were the only ones we found. Did she walk into the river at gunpoint?"

"Of course not. Why not swim away, if that were the case?" Sherlock looked back at the body, looking garishly colorful under the icy grey overcast. "Look at her clothes. She was a prostitute. She worked this area — knew where to run, where to hide. She wouldn't have gone to the edge of the river, lain down face-deep in the water, and intentionally drowned herself."

"But _why?_ There was no cranial trauma," Dimmock protested. "We'll do a tox screen, but the psychometrist said there was no alcohol in her system."

"You'll find oxytocin in her system," Sherlock said, his gaze wandering as if he were already bored of having to explain. "One set of footprints? No trace of drugs or alcohol? She had a client — one that actually provided a satisfying sexual experience for her. Probably male, though not necessarily — any idiot pathologist can tell you the details. The point is, her brain produced a chemical response that served to relax her, put her off her guard. She fell asleep. And afterwards, she sleepwalked here."

"She _what?_"

"Must I spell _everything_ out? A dreamwalker, Dimmock. Your killer's a dreamwalker." He stared at Dimmock for just a moment before looking toward the street, entirely dismissing Dimmock and the rest of the investigation team from his reality. "Come, John. Let's find something _interesting_ to do."

* * *

"It's a difficult compromise, managing sensory input," Sherlock explained, flopping bonelessly down on the sofa as the kettle whistled. "All psychometrists avoid casual touch, which most people respect, but a sensitive one will often self-shield with artificial fabrics. Polyester and such," he said distastefully.

"But don't psychics describe artificial fabrics as smothering? Suffocating?" John asked as he went to find the tea bags. "Ours were were always issued all-natural BDUs."

"I can only tell you what I've experienced," Sherlock said dismissively. "So you treated psychics in the army."

Steam rose in a cloud as John dropped the tea bags into the mugs and added boiling water. "We had a farseer in our unit. Iain Parker. Saved our lives more times than I can count." John shook off the memory, glancing back at Sherlock.

Sherlock returned the look with sharp, curious eyes. "Did he enlist while in training or after?"

John hadn't spent all these months at Sherlock's side without learning how to follow some of his thought processes. "He wasn't marked, no. He enlisted in his third-year training, and the military sent him to sniper school to understand how to be a spotter. I understand they recruit heavily while trainees are still young, so they can get additional training," he said as he added milk to one mug and three teaspoons of sugar to the other.

Sherlock's eyes narrowed as he considered this. "And it saves the trouble of removing their tattoos. A marked psychic in the field is a target."

"Not all of them, but most. Though you hear stories — empaths sensing people hiding during a building-clear, dreamwalkers picking up hints of planned attacks, that sort of thing."

"The CIA apparently attempted to use dreamwalkers offensively during Vietnam." Sherlock rolled his eyes. John grinned back at him, wondering if Mycroft had done something similarly ridiculous since taking over the British government.

Instead, he mentioned, "Dimmock asked again why you don't do this professionally." He settled down on the couch beside Sherlock, handing over his mug, reflecting idly that their armchairs never got much use these days. Not that he minded.

Immediately, Sherlock burrowed up under John's right arm, one leg sprawled over John's lap, head resting against John's chest. "Dimmock's an idiot."

"He isn't. He's just not you — _Don't tickle,_" John warned sternly, moving his tea to rest safely on the arm of the sofa.

Sherlock's answer was muffled by John's shirt as he skimmed his hand across John's belly to rest against his waist. Sherlock didn't have any trouble keeping his tea balanced on his knee, the bastard. Probably wasn't even cheating with his telekinesis to hold it in place. For someone that tall and gangly, he was amazingly graceful, at least when he chose to be.

John couldn't help but wonder how much of what Sherlock did was based on his psychic gifts. He always had a perfectly logical, mundane explanation for all of his deductions. Well, no — hardly _mundane_. Really, it was like bloody magic, watching him match up puzzle pieces that most people never even noticed, much less thought were important.

But it was terribly dangerous; John shivered just thinking about it, and his arm tightened around Sherlock's shoulders. Now, Sherlock had established his reputation for genius, but in those early days that he never mentioned, how had he known _how_ to cover up his gifts? Or was his ability to _observe_ just another type of gift, one that was purely intellectual and not psychic?

It had to be. It was something so inherent to Sherlock's whole being, John couldn't imagine him without it, even as a child. Without a single psychic gift, Sherlock still would have been extraordinary.

"You're a bloody genius, you know," John whispered, awed that somehow, Sherlock had chosen _him_ — boring, ordinary John Watson — to share his life.

Always modest, Sherlock's response was nearly predictable. "Of course I am," he said, and burrowed his face against John's neck with a contented sigh.

"No. Sherlock, I mean it," John insisted, nudging him. Somehow, his tea _still_ hadn't fallen. "What the hell are you doing with me?"

Sherlock lifted his head enough to look at John, baffled. Then his head tipped to the side and his eyes went distant. His hand pressed tightly into John's side, pulling him closer. "John... You don't see what's inside you — not like I do. You _care_."

"Of course I care. God, if you haven't figured that out —"

"No." He shook his head and sighed, reaching for the mug on his knee. He tasted it and moved his other leg over John's lap, leaning sideways against the back of the sofa, keeping John's right arm trapped.

John waited patiently, knowing Sherlock was trying to find the right words. He rested a hand on Sherlock's knee, stroking gently through the fine wool of his trousers. It took a good two-thirds of the tea before Sherlock stirred and took a deep breath, looking at him.

"People _say_ they care, but they don't. Some do, a little: Lestrade, which is why I'll work with him, even when he's irritating. Mrs Hudson," he said, getting a little smile. "Practically an angel, she is. But most people don't, and the _lie _of it, the conflict between what they think they feel and what is actually inside... That's where you're unique, John. There is no conflict in you. You are who you are, inside and out, which is extraordinary in its own right, but that with all of that, you choose to care for me... That is... remarkable."

Speechless, John could only stare, grateful that Sherlock had chosen words and not his empathy to convey _that_. He couldn't think of how to respond, and even if he had words of his own, he couldn't have forced them past the lump in his throat or the fire in his chest. His hand went tight on Sherlock's leg, and Sherlock's palm pressed over his fingers before he curled up against John's chest again.

It was a long, long while before he could speak again.


	2. Chapter 2

"Here, let's see. Bright light," John warned cheerily, shining the torch just beside the reddened, glassy eye of his young patient. (Caroline Connor, age nine, nosebleed caused by early trigger event.) He swept the light across her eye and back away, watching the pupillary reaction. "Good! That wasn't so awful now, was it?"

Between harsh sniffles, she said, "No," in a tiny voice denasalised by the cotton packing.

John snapped off the torch and dropped it into a pocket. "She'll be fine, Mrs Connor," John said reassuringly. "Bit of a lie down, ice pack on the back of her neck. Keep the lights low for a couple of days."

"She needs a specialist," Mrs Connor complained. "Someone from the Darrow Institute —"

"Mrs Connor," John interrupted, careful to keep his voice calm. He certainly had enough practise talking sense into Sherlock. He could handle a stroppy mum who wanted to push her little girl into early-onset psy-emergence. "She probably won't have another episode for several years. These sorts of things happen all the time. She may even grow out of it."

"What do you know?" Mrs Connor snapped, making Caroline flinch and look at her mother with wide, teary eyes. "This could be early-onset —"

She wasn't going to stop. Hiding his sigh, John interrupted again, "I'm sorry, Mrs Connor. I do need to see the next patient now. The nurse will be in to bring you some helpful literature. Excuse me."

He escaped while he could, full of pity for poor little Caroline — not because she was psychic, but for having to deal with so much anxiety at what was already a traumatic time. Charitably, he hoped that Mrs Connor was being so overprotective for Caroline's sake. If this was early-onset, Caroline's adjustment to life as a psychic would be much easier than it was for the majority who didn't come into their powers until their late teens.

He suspected, however, that Mrs Connor was thinking more of the substantial benefits cheque she'd receive from the EEFA. The Early Emergence Fund Act had been meant to help parents cover the additional costs of handling a psychic child during the adjustment years — specialised day care, telekinetic event damage, work hours lost, that sort of thing — but it had turned into nothing more than a financial incentive for parents to hope their children tested positive.

As John hung Caroline's chart outside the exam room door and went to tell the desk that she was ready to go, he couldn't help but think of Sherlock. Would Caroline, so bright-eyed and scared and sweet, develop one power or would she be a multi, locked away in the system out of misguided fear for what she might someday become?

* * *

"I, um... That is, I want to report — I was mugged, see..."

A few stammered words, a shy look, and he was _in_. People were such insects, buzzing around their hives, secure behind drywall and glass and steel. The metal detector didn't chime and the police swarming about didn't look twice. Why should they? There wasn't much to see with his plain grey T-shirt and faded jeans and his hands stuck in the pockets of his jacket. He let himself look tired, nervous, which was easy — _everyone_ was tense, in a police station.

He could turn his charisma on and off like a switch.

It was perfectly normal, too, for him to look nervously around, gaze flicking up to foreheads that were mostly unmarked. Finally he spotted a farseer sitting at a desk, squinting through glasses at a computer screen. _Idiot,_ he thought, walking hesitantly up to her. Farseers often had trouble with close-in vision; for one to take a job with computers was practically begging for eye surgery later in life.

Anywhere else, he would've shoved his hands nervously into his pockets, but here, that would just make people think he had a concealed weapon. Instead, he twisted his fingers nervously together, ducked his head, and kept his shoulders slumped.

"Um... hi?" he said softly to get her attention.

She held up a hand for a moment and didn't look up until she'd finished her typing. Then she gave him a quick, suspicious once-over before she met his eyes and smiled. "Something I can help you with?" she asked politely, her gaze dropping back to his chest. A tiny frown appeared when she didn't see the visitor's badge he should have been wearing.

Quickly, he put out his hand; farseeing was a purely internal psychic discipline, unaffected by physical touch. "Sorry, my name's Jim. I've never really done this before."

With a little sigh at the interruption, she turned enough to clasp his hand. He immediately understood why she was working a desk job at New Scotland Yard; the repulsive, crawling feeling of power was barely a tingle. He'd be surprised if she registered more than one on the Darrow Scale.

Still, it was better than nothing, and he made a show of explaining his fictional mugging while her eyes glazed just enough for his purposes. She'd looked tired before, just like most everyone else at the surrounding desks; now she looked exhausted.

"So, can you show me? And maybe get me one of those badges?" he asked, still holding her hand. It wasn't nearly as unpleasant now, more like a cool breeze just under the surface of his skin. He let go of her before she was completely drained of energy; he wanted her pliant, not unconscious.

"Umm..." She turned slowly, looking at her desk. It took a few seconds before she pulled open the top drawer and rooted around amid the pens and office supplies to find an old badge, laminate peeling, at the back. It was numbered at the bottom, and if it had been living in her desk for any length of time, the number would have been invalidated from the computer systems, but it was better than nothing.

He took the badge and hung it around his neck, saying, "You were going to take me upstairs, now, right? Homicide is upstairs, isn't it?"

"Oh. Yes," she said thoughtfully, getting to her feet. He watched her carefully — he didn't need her collapsing, or he'd lose her in the fuss that would surely follow. She kept her balance, though, and led him to the lift and up two floors.

When the lift doors opened, he stopped her from getting out. "Why don't you go back down to your floor? Have a kip in the breakroom. You look exhausted."

She nodded, faintly smiling. "Umm... yes. All right."

He patted her hand once more, feeling power spark from the contact, though not much. It would take her a few hours before she could think clearly, and even then, her memory of their encounter would be too hazy for her to give more than vague information.

As the lift doors closed, he walked down the hall, trying to look as though he belonged there. The badge helped immensely; no one looked twice at him, which left him free to quickly glance at everyone who passed.

The Met employed a slightly higher percentage of psychics than was displayed in the general population, but they were hardly common even here. The ones he did find were mostly technicians, going by their badges — usually diviners (marked with the V-tattoo supposedly reminiscent of old myths about divining rods) or psychometrists (tattooed with a stylised hand that in some cases looked more like a stick-figure drawing). The specific discipline didn't matter so much as the target's rank within the Met. He needed someone with access to secure rooms, not someone who didn't even have an assigned spot in a shared forensics lab.

Finally he spotted a likely candidate: an older man in a suit, coat open, tie loose. His forehead was marked with three parallel lines, gently undulating, like a child's drawing of a river. The mark of an empath. Probably close to retiring, out of shape from too many hours at a desk. Best of all, his badge bore the rank of Chief Inspector, which meant he'd probably be able to access almost any room in the building.

Including the evidence room.

* * *

As soon as the door to the flat closed, Sherlock was on John like a creeper vine, working his hands up under layers of clothes, burying his face against the side of John's neck, pressed against him from thighs to chest. Expecting this, John had already pulled off his jacket; he tossed it in the direction of the coat rack (missing, as always) and wrapped his arms around Sherlock.

"I'm here, love," John whispered, leaning his shoulders against the door, holding Sherlock close. "Go ahead."

As a sense of warmth suffused John's chest, he couldn't help but wonder, professionally, if Sherlock's empathy would register higher than nine point one on the Darrow Scale, now that he was no longer constantly suppressing it. At some point every day, whenever they were alone and safe, without the pressure of a case, Sherlock would pull John close as though trying to crawl into him and share his skin. And then, at John's invitation, he would circle them both with his mental shields and relax the self-imposed restraint that held his powers in check.

Most people thought Sherlock Holmes incapable of having emotion. At least two of Scotland Yard's empathic interrogation specialists refused to be in the same room with him, calling him a sinkhole of negative energy — a ghost. None of them suspected just how far they were from the truth.

"Tell me," Sherlock mumbled, his words muffled by John's clothes. His breath was hot through the layers of cotton and wool — natural fibres that were all John wore these days, after Sherlock had cleared John's wardrobe of everything with a hint of nylon or polyester, except for his standard-issue uniforms. John had accepted that for the most part, but he hadn't appreciated needing to go buy new socks and underclothes, and they'd had a very stern discussion about the benefits of such modern inventions as elastic.

"It's beautiful," John said, leaning his head against the door. His eyes were closed; he wanted to concentrate with every fibre of his being. He had never envied psychics before, but since discovering _this,_ he wanted desperately to _feel_ the way Sherlock did.

"Explain."

"So demanding," John said, his laugh hitching. His eyes were stinging with tears and his heart felt ready to burst.

It was like draining an infection, John had determined, putting it into familiar medical terms. Every sharing, good or bad, allowed Sherlock to take one more step towards recovering from more than all those years of living a half-life. So John encouraged it, no matter how traumatic it became for him — for both of them, actually.

Some days, it was like standing in one of the violent dust storms that would tear through the battlefields of Afghanistan, whipping stinging grit into every fold of cloth, abrading skin and stealing breath, a violent scouring that rent flesh and left John feeling raw and exposed as he shared Sherlock's self-loathing and terror at being discovered. Other times, he experienced the whitewashed nothingness that was Sherlock's world when he was locked behind his shields, his other-senses compressed and stifled.

Through John, Sherlock remembered how to smile and laugh and love. And slowly, the good sharings began to outnumber the bad. Today was the fifth day in a row without an emotional tsunami, and John wondered if they'd quietly passed a turning point.

"John," Sherlock complained, turning just enough to press the word against John's throat. His tongue darted out to lick at John's skin.

"You're an empath. You tell me," John teased, tipping his head to bare his throat further.

"I want _your_ words."

John laughed and hugged Sherlock closer, wondering if he _had_ words for this. He'd never been very good with poetry.

"It feels... warm," he said, and Sherlock huffed at the inadequate description. "It's like sunlight, the kind of warmth that goes all the way through you."

"The desert?"

"No. That sunlight felt like an attack. This... it's a spring day at the beach, when the sun is hot but there's still a cool breeze, so you could just lie there forever. It's so bright, it hurts to look, but I don't want to turn away. It's like I can see you through my skin."

Sherlock tugged John's layered shirts up even more. No case meant Sherlock was swanning about the flat in his ridiculously expensive dressing gown and silk pyjama bottoms, but instead of the matching top, he wore a sand-colored T-shirt made thin by too many washings and torn along the collar. It was John's oldest shirt, the tight one that he'd worn under his cold-weather gear while on winter night patrols; contrary to what most people thought, Afghanistan could get bloody cold.

"I want more," Sherlock insisted, his voice a low, demanding rumble.

"No surprise there," John said with a soft laugh, giving in and allowing Sherlock to extricate him from his layers of shirts. "Could you be more impatient?"

"Yes," Sherlock insisted, rubbing his cheek over John's scar, going right for his belt. Behind him, his phone rang.

Even before all this psychic openness between them, the force of Sherlock's personality had been overwhelming at times. Now, it took all of John's concentration just to remain standing. "Sherlock," he interrupted as firmly as he could. "We are _not_ doing this up against the door. Mrs Hudson could walk in any moment —"

"She was married to a man. It's nothing she hasn't seen before."

"Unless she was dating _two_ men at the same time, I'm certain we'll get to things she _hasn't_ seen — but — Are you going to answer that?" he asked as the mobile rang again.

Sherlock's answering growl was vaguely negative, ending with a triumphant little laugh as he got the belt unbuckled. "It can wait."

John was inclined to agree, but the ringing started up again, as if the caller had reached voicemail, immediately hung up, and redialled. Either it was someone incredibly irritating and deserving of a good telling-off or there was a legitimate emergency.

So John cheated, closing his eyes and letting himself think of what exactly he would do to Sherlock if the phone weren't ringing like mad. He could perfectly recall the taste of Sherlock's skin, the sound of his gasps and moans, the feel of his body writhing under John's touch.

Picking up the vivid images painted by John's mind, Sherlock inhaled sharply and leaned into him, forgetting all about his fight to get rid of John's trousers. "John..."

Seizing on the moment of distraction, John slipped free and went for the mobile, ignoring Sherlock's shout of protest. "It's Lestrade," he said, just as Sherlock caught up with him.

Long arms, unexpectedly strong, wrapped around John's torso, trapping his arms. "He can get his own," Sherlock muttered, biting just the right spot where John's shoulder met his neck. One night, Sherlock had cheated madly to uncover every single spot that made John's breath catch, and he was entirely willing to use that knowledge to his own advantage.

So John cheated back, answering the call with a slightly broken, "Hello?"

"Thank God," Lestrade said, sounding positively awful. "There's an emergency. Where's Sherlock?"

"Busy," Sherlock shouted at the phone from two inches away.

John nudged Sherlock's shin with one foot. "What's the problem?" he asked as Sherlock soothed the bite with short flicks of his tongue.

"Well, you know the psychometric evidence lock-up down at the Yard?"

Sherlock huffed, frustrated. "Anderson spell all the labels wrong?" he demanded, lips close to John's ear. Resigned to the fact that Sherlock wasn't going to let go of him long enough to actually take the mobile, John tipped it away so they could both hear more clearly.

Lestrade didn't even laugh. "It's erased."

"What?" John asked, baffled. "The labels?"

"No." Lestrade sighed. "God only knows how, but all the psychometric evidence — it's _gone_."

"Gone? What do you mean, _gone?_" Sherlock snapped.

"Erased! Gone! Like none of it was ever touched. The imprints are _gone._"

"That's not possible," Sherlock insisted, his arms going tight around John's body. This time, though, he was looking for comfort; John could feel the sharp, electric tingles of fear sparking skin-to-skin.

"Yeah, well. Every psychometrist we have agrees, and there's not a damned bit of evidence to explain it. Will you come?" Lestrade asked, his tone pleading.

Sherlock pressed his cheek against John's hair, moving just enough for John to feel him nod. "Yes. We're on our way."


End file.
